xlii NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
month I completed my seventy-fifth year, and am become almost 
a fixture. Only my eyes do not fail me. In the winter of 1889 
I had a paralytic attack, accompanied by almost complete 
incapacity for two entire months. Since then I have only been 
able to write very little, and I have been occupied principally in 
revising my collections and in preparing the exsiccata of them. 
I have a few last words to say on the Hepatics, but I do not 
know if I shall have the courage to complete them." 
And on Oct. 13, 1893, follows: — "Slater and I have dis- 
covered two lady botanists in our own neighbourhood — or rather 
they have discovered us. Mrs. Tindall's husband is brother of 
the proprietor of Kirby Misperton, but their home is in the south. 
Miss Lister, her cousin, is a clever botanical artist. Her home 
is in Dorset. They are very quiet, unassuming ladies — fine 
scholars (I envied them their familiarity with German) — and have 
both a fair knowledge of British flowers and mosses, but are 
comparatively new to Hepaticae." 
Shortly after writing the above he had a severe attack of 
influenza, which caused his death on the 28th of December, at 
the age of seventy-six years and three months. 
Richard Spruce's life was spent in continuous labour for 
science and humanity — as a teacher, an explorer of nature, and 
more directly by his successful work in the introduction of the 
valuable red bark into India. Although his labours for this last 
object, extending over two years, were largely contributory to his 
permanent loss of health, his friends had the greatest difficulty in 
obtaining for him, first the small Government pension of 50 a 
year in 1865, and in 1877, through the long-continued and 
earnest representations of Mr. (now Sir Clements) Markham, a 
further pension of £$0 from the Indian Government. Having 
lost the greater part of his savings through the failure of a 
mercantile house of the highest standing in Guayaquil, his means 
on his return to England were exceedingly scanty, so that he 
had to spend the last twenty years of his life in a small cottage 
sitting-room about 12 feet square, with a bedroom of equally 
limited proportions. Here he was carefully looked after and 
nursed by a kind housekeeper and a little girl attendant, who 
were also his friends and companions ; and in this humble 
dwelling he received visits from his numerous friends, and, amid 
all his pains and infirmities, was cheerful and contented. He 
was well acquainted with general literature, including the old 
travellers and poets — Shakespeare and Chaucer being always 
among his small collection of books. He was a musician and a 
